New app for Google Glass will be able to read your emotions

Retailers may have a new tool to greet and cater to our emotions in real time. San Diego based Emotient announced a new Sentiment Analysis prototype application for Google Glass.

The application is not limited to Glass, as Emotient has been building products designed to read and understand our emotions by reading our facial expressions. With the app for Glass, it may enable those wearing it to get a quick read on the sentiment of the person they are engaged with.

Sentiment Analysis can read the emotional state and overall sentiment (joy, anger, surprise, etc.) and present a quick summary in the wearer’s field of vision. Privacy advocates prompted Google to note that it was not going to add facial recognition features to its products without the necessary privacy protections set up.

However, that will not stop developers from build their own tools, and Emotient has gathered $6 million through bond sales which will open up a private beta for its software on Google Glass. There is a real application here, as companies that provide customer-facing services can be prepared to understand the mood you might be in, it may enable them to smooth things over and give you a better experience. Such a system would be very helpful in situations like getting checked in at the airport.

Emotient also sees an application for this in health care, where the software may be able to aid in the diagnosis through linking conditions to emotional state. No doubt, Sarah Slocum might have fared better if her Glasswear gave her a heads up about the mood of people at the Molotov’s bar a couple weeks ago.

For those that are still concerned about privacy issues, Emotient aggregates data that is anonymized, “We don’t store images. We basically take the data and aggregate it with other information we’ve taken from other individuals,” according to Emotient CEO Ken Denman. Below are some videos which get the idea across.


sources: Fast Company and PCMag